


Broken Glass

by Cant_We_Just_Dance



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angst, M/M, Minor Character Death, Too Many Metaphors, army mentions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2017-12-22
Packaged: 2019-02-18 13:54:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13101573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cant_We_Just_Dance/pseuds/Cant_We_Just_Dance
Summary: Alexander had never been one to accept handouts, even those given by people which he would trust with his life. Life didn’t mean much to him, anyways. Life was always just another way for him to climb up the social ladder, another way for him to grasp tightly onto the legacy he already possessed and still dare to reach for more. Hands filled easily with the golden threads of light that shone upon pages of his writings, yet for some, the brightness wished to disappear. Which would explain why the stained glass windows of falsified trust had shattered under the force of the storm that George found himself trudging through at the very moment.





	Broken Glass

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rascalisafatcat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rascalisafatcat/gifts).



Trust, in its own sort of way, is a form of glass. 

One can see right through it. Distractions are found on the other side of it, while it allows sunlight to filter through like droplets of water falling onto and caressing one’s face in a rainstorm. Rain and teardrops, while seeming the same, are quite different. Both may fall down one’s cheeks, though only the latter occur with trust when such a thing has been broken.

However, not all tryst is clear-cut. Other kinds are like stained glass windows, with colors projected onto the floor one stand on as they admire the intricacies. The world slows and maybe, just maybe, there is a picture to be shown, a story to be told, within the window. How each little shard could be polished and placed into a piece of fine jewellery and none would be any the wiser until it was dropped. Shards would splash as though they were footsteps in puddles, and one would need to wear the correct shoes in order to trek through such a thing on the ground.

Broken windows of cerulean trust crunched beneath George’s feet, a scowl lining deep on his face as his brow was furrowed in determination. His feet were not surrounded by the warmth of his usual rain boots, instead he wore his work shoes, made from fine, dark leather. Water soaked through the opening -which was already rather low-, and more only seeped in with each step, soaking his socks. The socks that his husband had laid out for him that very morning before having headed off to his own job. George had always tried to convince Alexander to join his workplace, to no avail.

‘Come work with me,’ George would beg softly, as though his words were not pleading but instead gentle, and as loving as the one she spoke into Alexander’s ear when his lover was asleep. ‘Come to my office. I’ll get you an office near mine. There’s plenty of room to progress, and your reputation will grow tenfold, my love.’

As always, though never in the exact same wording, Alexander would shy away from the offer, simultaneously shying away from any sort of chaste kiss or gentle touches that George had to offer in that moment. ‘I want to built my own legacy,’ He would whisper- though George could never understand what it was about legacy and Alexander. Men only crave what they think impossible to achieve- yet once they acquire such thing, they never truly know. ‘I want to be my own person, a man who doesn’t depend on his husband for a way to get through life.’

Alexander had never been one to accept handouts, even those given by people which he would trust with his life. Life didn’t mean much to him, anyways. Life was always just another way for him to climb up the social ladder, another way for him to grasp tightly onto the legacy he already possessed and still dare to reach for more. Hands filled easily with the golden threads of light that shone upon pages of his writings, yet for some, the brightness wished to disappear. Which would explain why the stained glass windows of falsified trust had shattered under the force of the storm that George found himself trudging through at the very moment. 

Were he to turn around at any moment, he would most likely still be able to see his house in the distance. It would stand tall and elegant, the Victorian styling and cut just as pronounced as it was in sunlight. ALexander had protested to living in such a residence, claiming that it was too luxurious for a man such as him. A man such as Alexander Hamilton deserved the world, as George had always believed. Believing and knowing, however, are rather different ways of existence. While on occasion they intertwine, weaving together as easily as a dream or a beautiful sort of nightmare. The kind of nightmare where afterwards the sleeping person would not wake up in a cold sweat, nor in a dry sort of lightning shock. Instead, it is the kind where one would awaken slowly, eyes fluttering open, only to be narrowed in a half-decent reaching grasp of what their mind had created.

Alexander always had those kind of nightmares during stormy nights.

George would always hold Alexander close to his chest, whispering soft nothings against his dark hair and quiet promises to be fulfilled in secrecy. His arms would be wrapped around his husband’s torso, holding him tight with the metal of his gold wedding band pressing cold against Alexander’s skin.

But wedding rings have a rather odd habit of appearing when they aren’t supposed to.

Take, for example, the one that George kept in the safe deposit box that he and Alexander shared. He had never thought, never spared a moment of his life to consider, that Alexander would be able to access the box. So, to an extent, he was slightly shocked when his husband opened the front door and glared at George with nothing more than spite and tears in his dark eyes. Confusion had flooded George’s mind in that moment, before Alexander raised his hand and opened his palm, revealing the small, shining golden ring with a small inscription on it.

Yours forever,  
Martha

“Do you want to explain this, or should I fill in the pieces for myself?” Alexander had asked accusingly, blocking George from entry into the house and relief from the pouring rain that soaked his clothes. “Why did I find this? Because if you’d moved on, I wouldn’t have. Because if you really loved me, you wouldn’t have held onto this piece of your ex-wife like… like this…”

“Alexander…” George had begun, his face falling into a sorrowful expression laced with a sort of regret that only found its way onto the face of a man that had done something he knew to be wrong. It sank though his body and into his hands, which neither twitched nervously nor found themselves in Alexander's own. “I… You weren’t supposed to know that I still… That I kept it…”

“But I do,” Alexander pointed out, a singular tear trailing down his cheek with those little three words. So often, George had been brought to tear by Alexander’s talent with verbalizing his thoughts, yet the physical reaction had been switched to the other man, it seemed. “I know that you kept your wedding ring, and I know that you didn't want me to know, which of course means that you knew it would hurt me.”

 

“I never wanted to hurt you…” George whispered, trying and failing to maintain a blank expression, one of the calm that he usually possessed in moments such as these. Moments such as these, however, whether during war or work- they never had Alexander. Sweet, darling Alexander, whose raven hair framed his tear stained cheeks- they were stained. Alexander had been crying for more than just in this moment. George had made Alexander cry, probably for all day, and now all he had left was the self-hatred that seemed determined to worm its way through his veins. It had been left to wind its way into his heart, vines with thorns that cut with each breath. Blood dropped down from his eyes in clear tears, and yet it was all too dark a crimson. If he could just reach out, bring his arms up and wipe away Alexander’s tears, free those brown eyes from the nothingness that flooded them-

Alexander pulled away, stepping back and trying to narrow his expression into one of hatred, of fury. Instead, all he could find was the sorrow that crashed at his feet like ocean waves. Gentle in a way that only something so cruel could ever be. “Don’t touch me,” He spat, voice cracking as he struggled to hold back a sob, arms shaking. “Don’t you fucking dare. You lost that right -if you ever even had it- when I found this. When you decided to keep this. Why? Why would you do this to me?”

 

“I wasn’t doing anything to you!” George exclaimed, before freezing in place as he realized the accusatory tone his voice had taken. He didn’t hate Alexander- hell, he’d married the man. But when his husband stood like this, making such words contort their way across the air that George struggled to breathe? Stability wasn’t a word that could accurately describe the soaked man standing on his own doorstep, as desperate as a beggar to find warmth and solace.“....Alexander. I would never hurt you- if I’d known it would hurt you so badly, I never would have done that. I just can't let go of something that was such a big piece of my life for so long-”

“Letting go is what you’re supposed to do when you get divorced!” Alexander countered, tears now dripping off his chin and splattering on the floor in erratic patterns, somehow louder than the pouring rain outside. “You divorced Martha, and it’s over! It was over ten years ago when you signed the divorce papers, it was over when we got together, it was over when we had our wedding, and it’s been over for fucking ever! Why can’t you just forget about her?!”

“Why can’t you just forget about John?” George asked coldly, only just beginning to realize how out of context his mind was. Although it had been the correct thing to say in order to win a debate, this wasn't a debate. This was his husband, standing desperate and crying, and now beginning to cry even harder. It was in that moment, a few seconds too late and not early enough to take it back or make it something else, that George realized he’d fucked up.

“...Because John died a month before our wedding…” Alexander whispered, no longer seeming to breathe as he uttered those few words. “He was supposed to get the next four months off of his deployment, he was supposed to come home the day after he died. You know that, right? I didn’t get the news until a few days before. Everything was planned, all his family was in town for the event- fuck, even my father was there, with my adoptive family. I had just gotten home from my fucking bachelor party and I opened the door hungover as hell to some poor kid in uniform holding a folded flag…. I was supposed to marry him. I loved him more than anything, and he didn’t even get to know.”

“...Alex, I-” George whispered, reaching up to hold his husband’s hand.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” He spat in return, pulling away even more. “...You wanna know why I can’t forget John? I see him everywhere- everywhere except you, because I love you. I...I love you so fucking much that it hurts, and you never learned to recognize pain. I can’t forget him because I seem him every time I hear the fucking doorbell- because I’m absolutely terrified that it’ll be your flag, next. That I’ll be that hungover mess I was five years ago, and I’ll have nothing left of you other than that damn folded flag. He died five years ago, and I let go, and I married you. I married you and let my engagement ring be buried with the only bits of John that they could manage to know were his. I love you. But if you keep acting like I shouldn’t have loved him, too, then maybe you should leave…”

“I don’t want to leave…” George whispered, casting his gaze down, knowing full well that any other movement would have made Alexander slam the door on his face. “And I’m sorry for bringing up John. I know that… That he’s a sensitive topic for you.”

“But you still said it,” Alexander pointed out. Instead of crying, he stood there. Not moving. Not sobbing. Not waiting.

Just something so distinctly Alexander that no one else would have been able to name it.

“You still said it, despite how hurtful you knew it would be. And you expect me to forgive you for it-”

“You will,” George retorted, biting his lip to hold back another comment. Alexander didn’t even know what he was talking about- it’s okay to hold onto bits of your past, right? He didn’t still love Martha, he didn’t crave her touch at all, in any small or big eway. Alexander was overreacting- that much came easily to the younger man. “You just need time.”

“George, I trusted you!...And you?   
You clearly never built that kind of trust for me.”

**Author's Note:**

> You liking this fic  
> gives me joy, you know,  
> so please click click click  
> in the comments below


End file.
